Your Academic CV

Your CV is a document you use to compete for resources. It provides a concise overview of your relevant skills, expertise and competence to prospective academic employers and funders.

 

There are two key CV types:

Master CV

Many researchers maintain a 'master CV':
A compendium of all of their professional experience - academic and non-academic. 

  • Building and regularly updating your master CV ensures that you don't lose or forget details of your research - and other professional - activity. 
  • A current master CV makes curating CVs for specific opportunities much easier, as all the information you need is at your fingertips - you just need to decide which is relevant for the opportunity you are applying for.
Targeted CV

It's likely that you will submit many CVs during your career. Each should be targeted or curated specifically to demonstrate your fit to the opportunity you are competing for, whether that is funding, a job or a promotion.

  • Targeted CVs should only contain relevant information that your evaluators can use to assess the merits of your application. 
  • CVs are often the last thing we prepare when sending applications, but a well-developed and laid out CV can make a big difference to the strength of your application.

 

🖋  Task:

  1. Set aside one hour in the coming weeks to focus on starting to build or (if you have one already) updating your master CV.
  2. Diary a one hour slot in your calendar every month to update your master CV with any new activities, publications, pre-prints, talks, seminars, meetings, reviewing or other academic (or relevant non-academic) tasks you have completed.